


Made a Demon Outta Me.

by alphadick



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Bikers, Alternate Universe - Werecreatures, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Angst, Biker Gang, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Baggage, Family Secrets, Forced Turning, M/M, Minor Character Death, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Typical biker gang activity, Violence, Werewolves, biker!jensen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-06-21 02:15:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15547371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alphadick/pseuds/alphadick
Summary: Jared's just trying to get out, get away, but suddenly he's neck deep is something even bigger than he ever dreamed. When the stuff of nightmares is actually real and suddenly he's one of them...one of the nightmare creatures...well, life certainly isn't going to go as planned. Add in a confusing swirl of hormones for a beefy biker, Jensen, who's not all he seems either, and well...looks like there's a full moon on the rise.





	1. oh, you won't see me when I'm comin'.

**Author's Note:**

> I entirely blame all the recent werewolf books I have read for this...also sons of anarchy because I started watching it and Jensen would be the hottesttttt biker. 
> 
> There's going to be a lot of plot development and more characters will be added as the story progresses as well as tags. I chose not to add archive warnings but there will be graphic violence (i don't consider it anything worse than what already happens in the show...but regardless you've been warned). 
> 
> (story banner is made by me!)

 

__

_[ “I said baby, you know I’m gonna leave you._

_I’ll leave you in the summertime,_

_Leave you when the summer comes a-rollin’_

_Leave you when the summer comes along.” ]_

The roll of the wheels under him, the hum of the radio, the leather under his palms all manages to soothe the bone deep ache currently strumming along Jared’s shoulder line. Jared jerks the wheel reflexively, realizing rather belatedly it was just something shiny reflecting off his headlights in the dark. He quiets the urge to furtively glance behind him, because if someone hadn’t followed him for the last 300 miles then they weren’t just going to materialize out of nowhere now. He can’t shake the feeling of unease that haunts him ever since he’d packed his meager belongings and gotten the hell out of dodge in his dad’s impala. _Shit,_ and ain’t that something. When Jared’s dad wakes up in the morning he’s going to be pissed enough to tear a strip off him, and that’s if he’s lucky. Jared still remembers the time he snuck into his dad’s workshop…he hadn’t been able to sit right for a week from the beating he got.

It was barely three in the morning when Jared crept out of the house and jumped into the impala without much thought besides getting as much distance between himself and his old home as possible. His quiet, sleepy suburb had certainly not been awake for the day yet. By the time anyone realizes he’s missing, maybe just maybe, he’ll be far enough away they won’t be able to come find him and drag him back. 

It hits him just outside of Austin, the bone deep exhaustion that floods his system and makes his lids heavy. He doesn’t quite want to go directly into Austin just yet. For now he settles with some small city called Jonestown. He gets off at the first exit and rolls into the sleepy, slowly waking town. Jared stops at the first crappy motel he sees. He pays for two nights, unsure of where he might want to go after, but two night’s sounds like a good amount of time to figure his shit out.

The man at the desk is young, probably only a few years younger than Jared himself, but utterly unconcerned with the world around him. Jared’s probably the first person to have walked in here all night…or day, Jared guesses as he notices the clock on the wall that reads it’s a little after eight AM. It’s a credit to the kid’s negligence that he doesn’t even glance up when Jared walks through the door, bell announcing his entrance and all. “Hey, can I have a room for two nights, king bed…” Jared glances over the interior of the room, eyes skipping over the multitude of brochures tucked inelegantly into a wooden shelf. “—and where’s the nearest bar?”

The kid takes his sweet time looking up from his phone, eyes blinking slowly like there is anything else he would rather be doing than helping Jared. Finally, he clicks some things on the computer and accepts Jared’s money without much hassle. Apparently, there’s some dive bar a few blocks away, just perfect for Jared’s liking because that means he can walk there and back. His plan to get smashed six ways from Sunday is looking better and better with every second. The kid sends him off to room 10, second floor but multiple exits, which puts some primal part of Jared’s brain at ease.

Motel rooms are usually part and parcel of the town’s local flavor and this one is no different. Jared walks into gaudy southern charm with a touch of texas roadhouse. The bedspread matches the wallpaper with its multitude of obnoxious galloping horses. Ten minutes after bringing his bags in and Jared’s vision is already swimming with them. He makes a quick escape to the bathroom where he nearly tears his clothes off in an effort to get under the subpar spray of shower water. It’s blessedly hot though, enough that when Jared steps from the tub his skin is a healthy pink from the heat. 

He wipes the mirror haphazardly, a zig-zag forming in the mist the clogs the room. Jared looks even worse than he feels, if that’s possible, and even the shower doesn’t seem to have rejuvenated his appearance much. Back in his room, he pulls on a pair of raggedy sweats and an old tshirt before crawling into the bed and forgetting the world.

||

Jared wakes much later to a slamming door and a series of voices screaming as they run down the outside walkway. A quick glance at the bedside table tells him that it’s nearly five in the afternoon, meaning he’d passed out for close to 9 hours. There’s a steady trail of drool leading from his mouth onto the pillow and Jared swipes at it as he rolls over and sits up slowly. Now that he’s awake he realizes some more things about the room that his exhausted self hadn’t categorized before. Like the fact that his feet hang about a foot off the bed and that there’s even little cowboy hats on the sheets. He runs a hand roughly through his hair, already realizing that he shouldn’t have fallen asleep with wet hair because now it’s going to be a fucking mess.

Vaguely, he realizes his dad and brother must have figured out he’s gone by now, that his room’s a little emptier than usual and the impala’s gone. They must have tried to call him by now, or traced his phone and found it resting in a ditch along the highway. It’s a little jarring, it’s never going to be the same after this. The thought is enough to bring a shadow of a smile to Jared’s face. It’s the best he can do at the moment.

After finally summing the energy to get out of bed Jared’s stomach gives a loud growl, finally coming to life after a night on the run. He dresses quickly, throwing on briefs, ripped jeans, a Henley and his leather jacket. Jared shoves his keys and his wallet into his back pocket. For a moment Jared looks for his phone, forgetting rather quickly that he threw that thing in a ditch some two hundred miles back. That will have to be purchase numero uno when he’s more stable in the next few days. Last second, Jared roots through his duffle until his hand hits cold steel. In the dim light of the motel room he recognizes the glock he had hastily packed as he was dipping from home. It had always been a point of contention for him, something forced on him by his family that had always made him feel weird and alone. Jared shoves it in the back of his jeans and tosses aside those thoughts quickly, unwilling to travel down that road.

In the mirror Jared looks haggard, like he hasn’t slept in years instead of hours. The mixture of paranoia and anxiousness managing to make him feel dead on his feet, regardless of having woken up only an hour or so ago. It’s the kind of tired, he realizes, that’s going to take weeks of settling in somewhere he feels his dad and brother can’t reach him. His stomach growls again, this time with an accompanying stomach cramp that makes Jared curse. He’d barely eaten the day before, stomach too much in knots over the idea that he’d be stealing away in the night for him to truly enjoy dinner with his brother like he usually does. Those nights are some of the good memories he has. Just him and Jeff spread out on the couch, drinking beer and eating something deep-fried and greasy. They’d watch bad movies and curse at the TV and for a moment Jared would be able to pretend they were normal. And then real-life would come crashing in and that’s why he wanted out so bad. 

Jared exits his room and stomps down the stairs to his car. The impala sits imposingly in the tiny parking lot, standing out in its sleek black exterior next to rusted mini vans and old Cadillac’s. Even with the light dusting of splattered mud down the sides from some of the back roads that Jared took, it’s still stunning. Yeah, if his dad ever finds him he’s fucked.

He decides to drive around and try to find a place to get something to eat. Jared quickly realizes that the town is rather small, situated in a long line all connected to a single road called Main Street. Down a few blocks there’s a mom and pop shop on the corner of an intersection that boasts something about having the best pie in the state. It’s like his stomach somehow manages to drag him in that direction, because next thing he knows he’s parallel parked on the street and is breezing in through the front doorway. 

It smells heavenly the second he steps through the threshold, making his mouth water pleasantly and his stomach grumble even louder. He rubs it without a second thought, knowing that soon it will be filled with something decidedly delicious. A rather attractive blonde woman beams at him from the counter, “just sit anywhere you like hun, I’ll be right there to take your order.”

Jared glances around before deciding to just take a seat at the bar counter. The place is relatively busy, more than a few of the booths and bar stools taken by eagerly chatting customers. It’s rather idyllic, if Jared’s being honest with himself, and exactly what he would expect for a small town such as this. “I’m Samantha, I own this joint, but you can call me Sam. Here’s a menu kid,” she slides a one sheet, laminated menu to him and then glides off to fill some more coffee for somebody down the counter. Jared barely has to spend any time looking at the menu before he settles on the shepherd’s pie, a coffee, and a piece of the blueberry pie. Sam sidles up right at the exact moment he’s ready like she has some sixth sense to his needs.

“I’ll take the shepherd’s pie with a cup of coffee please ma’am, and then a slice of the blueberry pie after if that’s alright,” Jared orders succinctly, pleased to see the smirk that alights on the woman’s face as she whirls around to whip up a cup of coffee for him.

“I’ll have that out in two shakes sugar,” she croons back, winking at him as she deposits the saucer and cup of coffee delicately on the linoleum.

Jared’s eyes nearly roll into the back of his head at the first sip, the caffeine doing something infinitely good for his soul. Sam looks amused as she rings up a costumer on one side of the counter. He lets his mind wander a bit, he’ll have to settle down eventually. The cash he withdrew for several days leading up to his sudden departure will only last him so long after all. He can’t use credit cards, that would be too simple for his dad to track him down. No, he needs to remain off the grid for a good while…until they’ve given up looking for him. He could swipe someone’s wallet, use those credit cards for a while maybe? Jared sighs heavily, mind aching with the thought of burrowing himself deep enough underground that no one can reach him. 

The bell ringing over the door shakes Jared out of the intense staring contest he’s having with his coffee, a heavy set of boots clomping over towards the register where Sam exuberantly greets whoever it is. “Hey sweetheart, didn’t expect to see you at this time,” Jared looks over to see a man leaning off the side of the counter. The long line of his body resting on one solid elbow, the rest of his body drawn in a casual shrug with his feet crossed at the ankle. He’s got a motorcycle cut on with what looks like a wolf howling at the moon stitched on the back. Jared can’t seem to pull his eyes away, drawn to the solid line of the man’s neck, how it curves into his shoulder and down. The man’s legs are doing something sinful and wicked to Jared, if he’s completely honest with himself…a plate plops down with a clack in front of his face, startling Jared enough that he whips his head back. Sam looks even more amused than before, especially when Jared does a double-take back towards the register and realizes he must have been staring off into his own world for long enough that the hot stranger is gone.

“Hope you enjoy your shepherd’s pie sugar,” Sam winks lightly, causing the flush to go even further down Jared’s neck to touch his collar.

He nearly inhales the food, his stomach picking that moment to wake up even hungrier than before, and every bite is heaven. Sam smiles on encouragingly and comes over to fill his coffee every so often…and to tell him to chew between bites before he chokes. The blueberry pie is even better than he imagined and a part of Jared aches over the fact that this is probably the only time he’ll have to sample that piece of beauty. He can’t stay here. There’s a solid plan in place, and besides that Jared won’t be comfortable only being four hours from home. Running away effectively requires quite a bit more distance. 

“Thank for the meal ma’am,” Jared murmurs, handing over a crisp twenty despite the prices being low enough that he’s essentially tipping $12 for his meal. She positively beams, patting his hand affectionately as she cleans up his plates, offering him another slice of pie in the process, which he steadfastly declines. She waves after him as he leaves, and Jared waves back, pretending for all intents and purposes that he plans to be a repeat customer.

He trudges back to his car, feet dragging across the rough pavement as he watches his shadow lengthen with the setting of the sun. It sets so early nowadays it seems, stripping the sky of that bouncy blue and streaking it with shades of yellow and red. The exhaustion from the last day or so comes back full force, making his shoulders heavy and his feet uncoordinated. Behind the wheel of the impala he steadfastly does not look at the picture he knows is pinned under the sun visor and merely makes the drive back to the crappy motel on autopilot. Jared pulls into the parking lot to witness a scene that does nothing but further drive the life out of him. There must be at least fifty people crammed into the too small pool area, there’s a loud boombox pumping the year’s latest hits for the whole motel to hear and everyone’s screaming over it to be heard. His eyes travel from the pool area to his lone room on the second floor near the corner. Wayyyy too close in Jared’s opinion, and definitely not an option for a quiet evening of rest. He sighs noisily, blowing air out his mouth like it will help the tension headache he feels developing behind his eyes. 

It all calls for a stiff drink, something to wipe his brain and lift his spirits. He’s out after all, he made it out and it’s going to stay that way. Motel guests, stolen car, and headache be damned. Jared suddenly remembers the bar that the kid told him about, how it’s not too far from the motel. Things start looking up at the prospect of a stiff drink—or a few—to muddle the aching and tiredness that’s settled into Jared’s bones like a plague.

It’s a relatively short walk to the bar, through a park that has some straggling families and children running around post dinner. Jared had spent close to two hours in the diner, when all is said and done and he finally got back to his motel. It might be a little early to be so keen on getting trashed, but Jared doesn’t really care for being ‘proper’ if it means he can get drunk enough he forgets his own name. Jared enjoys the park in a detached sort of sense, like the lingering heat of the day is soothing and the play of shadows intriguing, but besides that Jared is nonplussed when he hits the streets again and is suddenly bathed in the lights from various store fronts. The sun having set enough while he was under the cover of the park’s trees, for the different businesses lining the road to gear up for nighttime business. The bar’s down another block and around the corner that the street seems to almost dead end, but it’s merely an illusion of light made possible by zero street lamps continuing off into the bare expanse of Texas landscape. But right there, at seemingly the end of the city, across the last intersection sits a one-story building. All dark-stained wood and brick, lit up with neon beer logos and a slightly crooked sign spelling out Bad Moon Motorcycle Club. There’s a rickety porch that covers the whole front portion of the bar, a few scattered chairs—beaten up and bruised—but in front, lined neatly are rows upon rows of motorcycles. He briefly thinks he should have asked the kid for more details, but it’s a fleeting thought, overpowered by the need for a stiff drink. Besides, he’d been to some pretty sketchy places before and he’s tall enough that usually people don’t mess with him. 

The board’s creak under his feet as he climbs the three steps to the door, pushes it open quickly and tries not to shudder as some of the deafening noise quiets at his entrance. Eyes turn towards him, zeroing in on the stranger at the door. If Jared wasn’t so bone dead tired he might have felt threatened by the atmosphere, but as it is he merely stumbles over to the bar and takes a seat heavily on a worn stool. The interior of the bar is done in heavy oak wood, stained as dark as sin with scattered tables and booths. In the back Jared can see some pool tables and an old jukebox, everywhere he looks he sees the same black cut adorning the members of the club. This would be a first for him, wandering into a motorcycle club looking for a drink. He can practically feel the eyes that land on him, branding him an outsider.

Jared’s startled from his thoughts by a rough-gravel voice parking itself in front of him. “—hey man, you need something?” He looks up into startlingly emerald eyes and nearly swallows his tongue.

“—uh, uh, whiskey, a double, neat,” Jared manages to mumble, tripping over the words like they’re molasses falling from his mouth. The man doesn’t falter however, grabbing a glass and placing it on the aged wood in front of him before deftly swinging the bottle of whiskey upside down and filling it with amber liquid. It’s not even a second after the man has slid the glass into Jared’s reach that he grabs for it and downs the burning liquid with an almost callous care for his poor throat. ‘Emerald eyes’ cocks an eyebrow at him, his features turning almost smug.

“Rough week?” The bartender guesses, immediately moving to fill Jared’s glass again, his pour a little excessive for a double but maybe he’s taking pity on the man. 

“The roughest,” Jared practically growls, this pour taking two swigs to down before glass hits wooden bar again.

“Well then, I’m glad to help,” and Jared decidedly tries not to hear the suggestiveness of their words because there is no way some hot biker bartender is hitting on him. There is definitely no way and Jared’s not trying to get his ass kicked tonight. Even if he could do with a stress relief, fighting had always been a source of pride for him, the only time his coltish limbs could be considered graceful and coordinated. “Want another?” And Jared feels himself nodding.

||

Jared learns emerald eyes is actually _Jensen_ and he owns the bar, which leads to Jared tipsily gushing about how much he loves the interior of the bar and Jared would do it again if it would get Jensen to grin in that roguish way of his. Jensen’s fun, smart, quick to smirk at all of Jared’s little quirks, and god…those legs. Jensen wanders off from time to time to fill an order here and there but always wanders back to where Jared’s seemingly parked himself for the night. He’s got what Jared likes to call ‘cowboy swagger’, which comes from legs that look like he was raised on a horse since birth or someone fucked him too well the night before. Either way, Jared can’t quite stop the image that flashes into his mind of sliding between those bowlegs.

Jensen keeps catching him staring, but instead of raising the alarm to his buddies he just grins that shit-eating smirk of his and fills up Jared’s glass another time. As the alcohol keeps flowing it’s almost easy to convince drunken Jared that Jensen’s interested and barking up his proverbial tree. Which would be nice if Jared weren’t completely inept at normal human social interaction—or flirting as the youngin’s like to call it. But Jensen seems content with Jared’s easy dimpled smiles and soft laughter and endless stories about people he’s encountered throughout his short life. It’s almost sweet actually, Jensen has this boisterous laugh that fills the room, and he spends more time at the end of the bar with Jared than talking to the bar flies pushing their tits onto the polished wood for his perusal. The man seems to find it endlessly hilarious that Jared either has the biggest balls alive, or is so completely oblivious that he just walked into a biker bar like it was nothing. He’s not sure whether he’s figured it out or not.

Jared’s double-fisting a beer and a shot glass when Jared makes the startling realization that he’s smashed. He straightens himself with some effort, having started leaning who knows how long ago. Jensen’s telling him about some story from when he was a kid but Jared’s eyes can only seem to focus on the movement of the man’s lips. “—y’know most people kiss me when they stare at my lips like that,” Jensen teases, which startles Jared enough that he can drag his eyes up Jensen’s face to his eyes. Except there’s four eyes not just two and that throws Jared for a loop. Also, sometime during their talk Jensen had leaned forward over the bar, his muscled forearms coming dangerously close to brushing Jared’s knuckles and his face hovering a mere foot from his own.

“—I was readin’yur lipz,” Jared slurs gracelessly, earning a deep, dark chuckle from Jensen who obviously doesn’t believe the lie. It does something to Jared who squirms in his seat and tries to commit that sound to memory for later when he’s alone in bed. Jensen stopped filling up his glass a while ago it seems and now he takes the empty pieces from his hands and lets his touch linger far longer than Jared thinks it should take to pry them from his digits.

“Do yah’ need a ride home?” Jensen asks all whiskey smooth, face even closer than before, eyes bouncing between Jared’s as he searches for his answer in their depths.

And Jared wants to say yes, actually almost does, it’s there on the tip of his tongue but he freezes. He’s drunk, dead drunk, and alone for the first time in a long time. It’s as exhilarating as it is intimidating and suddenly Jared’s exhausted all over again.

“I’m pretta’tire, tanks fur th’offer, maybe ‘nother time?” Jared mumbles lightly, his fingers are clumsy as they grab for his wallet and attempts to pay. It’s somewhere after the fact that Jared doesn’t remember ever getting a bill but suddenly Jensen’s back, returning his card to him and smiling softly.

“Lemme walk you out at least, ‘kay?” Jared nods softly, swaying to his feet unsteadily and suddenly Jensen’s right there beside him steadying him with a hand on his bicep. Jared feels almost giddy, like he’s flying across the aged wood right to the door. Outside the temperature has dropped a few degrees but Jared feels nothing but warm, heated even, down the line that is Jensen pressed against his side. At the top of the stairs Jensen stops them, and releases Jared with an almost reluctant sigh. A sigh that almost immediately transforms into a deep chuckle when Jared practically slides down the steps. Jensen immediately hops down to help him up, continuing to chuckle as he dusts the man off, a little too hands-y in some places but Jared’s not complaining. He swears he feels the man’s nose in his hair, taking in his scent, but then again, he’s not really sure of anything at the moment. “You sure you don’t wanna take me up on that offer?” Jensen’s voice is filled with light amusement, but his face looks more concerned by the minute. Jared tries to stand straighter, a poor semblance of sobriety that does nothing to fool Jensen.

Jared sways a bit; vision dancing and his lips itch in that way where he wants to scratch them on someone else’s face. Preferably Jensen’s, specifically his lips, and maybe that stubble that is doing certain things to Jared’s dick that he’d rather not settle on. “Thanks, really.” Jared promises himself that he’ll be back another night, he’ll take the man up on his offer, but when he’s less drunk so that he can remember every hot, sweet second of it.

Jensen let’s the corner of his mouth twitch up in a grin, smug, like he knows Jared will be back. “Be safe Jared,” and the deep, whiskey rough rumble stays with Jared for the first block back to the motel.

Jared staggers gracelessly into the park from earlier, ignorant to the quiet stillness that has settled in the wake of human activity. He’s ensconced in the foliage when he’s shocked from his dazed thoughts to a sound off to his left. There’s some raucous laughing, a few men, their voices carrying towards him through the stillness of the night. Jared’s hair stands on end, a common reaction as he realizes the incredibly late hour. It’s the twinge in his gut that has him sobering slightly under the moonlight. The laugher fades off, somewhat calming the man but he tries to hurry through the rest of the park anyway. It’s the alcohol that’s still coursing through him that makes him think the first few growls are his imagination. But the next one is practically a howl, coming from a section of the park a mere twenty feet from him. He doesn’t even think, just draws the gun in his waistband, listening to the gut instinct currently trying to tell him to run full-tilt in the opposite direction. His gut has never been wrong, and it isn’t in this case.

A blur hits him from the right, knocking him into the damp grass and pressing on his chest menacingly. If it weren’t for all his dad’s training of keeping a gun in hand no matter what, Jared probably would have let the damn thing go with the impact. He’s choking in air, trying to refill his lungs enough to stop the burning in his chest. His wrist aches, the bones creaking as Jared shakily tries to lift it. Of course, it’s his goddamn gun hand, fingers circled around the grip enough to lift the muzzle and aim it towards the massive hulking thing on his chest. It’s a wolf, a fuckin’ huge ass wolf and Jared manages to squeeze off a few rounds, the bullets nuzzling deep into the chest of the thing but it only manages to dislodge it a bit. It howls so loud Jared’s ears ring and he winces into himself, trying to escape the sound. At least he can breathe better now,  so he draws a lungful of air in, which helps him think, helps him focus. The thing’s mouth is open, giant maw glinting with _his_ blood, manically grinning Jared would say if he thought animals could even show human emotion. Something latches onto his leg and Jared realizes there’s more than one, razor-like teeth shredding his skin, through the muscle and straight to the bone. There’s some unbelievable pressure, something in his leg feeling like it’s about to burst. He realizes he’s screaming, vision whiting out for a second as the beast cracks through his lower leg bones like a chicken wing. The other one hulks over him, swiping at his chest with a massive claw and shredding his shirt succinctly. It’s mere instinct that has Jared fighting for survival, arm raising to push the muzzle of his gun against the underside of the beast’s jaw and squeezing off another few shots. The bullets go through the thing’s mouth two exiting through it’s upper jaw and one exiting through it’s left eye. Jared wonders how he’s not deaf as the wolf lets out another ear-shattering howl and flings itself off to the side. The wolf is shaking it’s head from side to side, whimpering morosely as it paws the ground feverishly. It’s flinging blood about, coating the dewy grass red in the bright moonlight. The other wolf lets go of his leg, moving off to nudge at it’s buddy. Jared’s going in and out, going into shock he’s sure, but he’d still try to run if he thought he even had a snowball of a chance escaping. 

He tallies his injuries, knows his leg must be a hopeless wreck and his wrist is protesting even the slightest movement. Jared pushes to his forearms, grunting with the stretched tight feeling of his skin under the wounds he’s suffered. The blood is already getting cakey in the hollows of his body, eerily going from hot to cool as it dries in the cold night. Jared looks like he’s steaming, the cold air sucking the heat from his leaking wounds. His grunts of pain seem to attract the attention of the uninjured wolf who turns with a look of deadly calm. Jared hadn’t thought this is how he’d die when he left home yesterday but here he is about to get massacred in the park. He briefly thinks of the way his mom will cry when she reads the news report, his image tastefully blurred so as not to turn the public’s stomach with the brutality.

Jared knows there’s one round left in the gun, knows this because his father taught him to count shots from before he was ten, before he even ever held a gun he was forced to recite numbers of how many rounds his dad had gone through at the range that day. It had all been rather tedious but now he’s thankful in a way. No use wasting a shot unless the thing is nice and close. At least he can try taking one of the damn beasts out with him. It lunges in the next second, hulking form throwing itself over him, jaws wide. Jared thrusts the gun into the thing’s mouth and aims up towards the brain. He squeezes the trigger and feels an aerosol spray of blood coat his face. The bulk of its weight landing straight on Jared, his vision wavers with his breath, sparking out as the pain heightens to a crescendo that has him gasping. His world tilts on an axis, vision whiting out and he’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully you enjoyed the first chapter, please subscribe and leave me a comment so that I know there are people that want more!
> 
> Maybe I'll even share my playlist is you guys want!


	2. felt a lot of pain, but it didn't stop my heart.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jared never intended for any of this to happen. Waking up after last nights horrible attack is a blessing, but what's going to happen to him now? And this town's just weird, especially Jensen--stupid hot Jensen.

 

||

 

_[ ‘ I thought about my friends and the way I didn’t give enough_

_And I shoulda told my mother ‘mom, I love you’ like a good son_

_But this life is overwhelming and I’m ready for the next one. ’ ]_

 

 

Consciousness comes like a bag of rocks to the head, startling suddenly to wakefulness in a way that his body protests heavily. The light hurts his eyes, fresh dawn cresting the trees of the park and bathing him in the warm glow of a new morning. Jared curses as he accidentally jostles his hurting wrist, the memories flooding through the confusion of his previous unconsciousness. He jerks up without thought, fear shooting through him when he remembers the two gigantic beasts that had been trying to finish him off. The adrenaline is a short-lived thing, his chest heaving in pain as he works to calm his panicked breathing. He fucking hurts, that’s for sure, but there’s no sign of the two creatures. An aborted motion to swipe a hand through his hair is halted almost immediately when his wrist begins throbbing anew. Slowly, agonizingly slowly Jared manages to push himself up onto his elbows to take stock of the situation.

His clothes are ripped to hell, covered in blood, and he’s surprised someone hasn’t called the cops on him looking the way he does. He’s still loosely clutching his gun like his life depends on it, even emptied out there’s a surprising amount of comfort there. Jared squints up at the sky and judging by the position of the sun, it’s rather early, which probably explains why no one has stumbled upon him yet. Logically he knows he needs to get out of here, whatever happened last night wasn’t natural. Those wolves had been gigantic, bigger than anything Jared had ever seen before and the feeling in his gut is rolling with unease. The hair on the back of his neck hasn’t gone down since he regained consciousness and Jared knows that setting the primal part of his brain at ease means getting out of the open, shoring up his weaknesses, and figuring out what the fuck just happened.

That means assessing the damage so to speak. Relatively, Jared knows he hurts, the pain thrums through his body like one solid ache that’s causing a tenacious migraine to form behind his eyes. His skin feels tight with the dried blood that covers quite a bit of his exposed skin, but he pushes past the odd feeling and somehow manages to sit up slightly. He’s leaning heavily on his good arm, hip protesting the bending motion that Jared is trying to work it into. Jared takes a pause to focus himself, concentrates on his breathing and mitigates the pain as best he can. Around him is a shallow stain of blood, flecked and dried from last night. The smeared trails are what catch his eye. Blood that can’t belong to him, because there’s entirely too much of it, had pooled a bit before being smeared and dragged off into the grass and through the trees. There’s huge ass paw prints in the puddles, ominously leading a ghostly trail that helps Jared determine that one of the wolves must have dragged off its companion when Jared injured—killed?—it. Besides the blood and Jared’s own beaten and bruised form…it would almost be believable that nothing went down last night.

The dull throbbing in his leg suddenly reminds him of the intense pain he’d felt as the thing tried to rip the limb off last night. Even just thinking of the pain has Jared turning green and woozy, and the thought of having to look at the probable bloody stump that should be his lower limb is just making it all worse. He steels himself, breathes in deeply a few times despite the intense stabbing pain in his side, and looks…it’s raw and red and angry…but ultimately whole. His foot’s where it’s supposed to be and when he concentrates he can wiggle his toes despite the angry rush of pain that comes with it when he flexes the tendons and muscles down there. Jared had been half expecting hamburger helper down there—not this—he swears he’d felt the bone crack…

On second thought, even the multitude of scratches on his body look better than he thought. The big one on his chest had felt like it’d punched right through his sternum when the beast had swiped at him, but all there is now are four jagged pink lines painted from his left nipple diagonally down across his right ribs. They don’t even seem that deep and a healthy looking scab has already started stitching the marks together.

All of it just seems rather surreal, Jared had thought last night was the end, that there was no coming back from this…but here he is.

Gritting his teeth he finally shoves himself to his feet. Jared staggers to the side a bit, his leg tender from where the creature bit into his calf. Shit, he’d give anything for another drink right now.

It’s a slow, lazy crawl back to the motel, Jared feeling every little bruise and scrape along his form. He stows his gun in his waistband when he breaks from the tree line of the park. Thankfully, there doesn’t seem to be anyone lingering around the outer exterior of the motel this early. It hurts the most trying to limp his way up the stairs to his room, and takes longer than he would like before he’s carefully ensconced back in his motel room.

He immediately moves through the tiny room to the bathroom and gets the shower started. The mirror starts fogging pretty quickly but Jared just scrubs a quick swipe over the surface with his good hand. Pulling off his clothes turns into a whole other task that seems to pinpoint every single aching piece of his body and causes more than a few hisses to escape through grit teeth. His body looks like he went twelve rounds with Mayweather and somehow lived to tell the tale. Vaguely, Jared realizes he should probably go to the hospital and get treated for potential rabies or something. Sighing, he turns from inspecting himself in the mirror and hobbles into the shower.

At first the sting of the hot water makes him jumpy under the spray but eventually the combined heat and steam are more soothing than painful. It feels almost good as he gently scrubs the blood off his skin and feels a bit more human in the process. His wrist is still creaking ominously and his leg is a little worrisome, so Jared knows he’s going to have to stop by the hospital regardless.

He’s almost remiss of leaving the shower, but eventually, when the spray starts getting a little cold, he removes himself from the warm cocoon of the steamy bathroom. Jared pulls on a worn pair of jeans, frowning when he realizes one of his favorite pairs was ruined in the almost massacre last night. He pulls on a shirt and the same leather jacket he had on last night, realizing the garment was the least harmed out of all his clothes. The blood is nearly indiscernible against the deep black regardless, and Jared’s just jumpy enough that he needs something to hide the fact that he’s carrying—his glock and an extra magazine. Instead of shoving it in his waistband this time he drops it into the inner pocket along the right side of his jacket.

As he’s leaving his room, Jared realizes he doesn’t know where the doctor is in town. Normally a problem he would quickly solve with a simple google search but he’s phoneless. Jared swallows the disgruntled sigh when he realizes he’s going to have to visit the front office and ask for directions. He might as well buy another night in the place since he’s in no shape to be driving anywhere long distance. A part of Jared wants to drive his car over to the office, but it’s almost embarrassing how short of a distance it is from point A to B. He’s just being whiny because the pain is starting to leak back and it’s causing a tension headache to pound around his skull.

The bell over the door rings to announce his presence and Jared is pleasantly surprised to see that an older man has replaced the surly teen from the previous night. “What can I help yah wi—th son?” The man stutters audibly when he looks up from his newspaper and gets a good look at him. He waffles for a second, upper lip quivering like he might ask something but ultimately his mouth stays shut. Jared can only assume it’s from years of running a low rent motel that he’s able to still his curiosity so easily.

“Can you point me in the direction of a hospital? And I want to pay for one more night if I can?” Jared tries to give his most reassuring smile but the man’s brow creases even further. Thankfully, he still seems steadfast on not asking any questions he might not want the answer to.

“Sure son, doc’s down main street, take a right at the diner and he’s the third building on the right, old brick building. Doc Beaver will patch you up,” he asks for Jared’s room number and then accepts the cash that Jared holds out to him for another night.

“Thanks sir.” The old man looks genuinely relieved to be sending Jared off, like him walking out the door means he’s washed his hands of him.

Getting into the car and off his leg is a huge relief, only then had he realized he was sweating with the effort of putting weight on it. It’s a relatively short drive to the doc’s office, but driving past the diner is its own torture as he catches a whiff of whatever the day’s special is. Only then does Jared realize he’s absolutely starving. Giving his stomach a sympathetic pat and promising himself he’ll drop by after he gets patched up, he turns away from the diner and down the opposite road. On the right, exactly where the old man had described is a small brick building with an antique sign reading ‘Doctor’s Office: Jim Beaver M.D.’

He parks and limps his way in, the door creaking loudly as he swings it open. A petite brunette lifts her head from the reception desk and her eyes get comically wide as she takes him in. Jared’s sure he looks loads better than how he woke up in the park, but it’s still disconcerting that people keep looking at him like he came back from the dead. “Sorry, I don’t have an appointment but can I see the doc?” Jared asks sweetly, hobbling up to the counter and giving her his most reassuring smile. Her nametag says Genevieve and her head bobs lightly in response to his statement before she catches herself not speaking.

“Yes—sorry, yes, I’m sure Dr. Beaver can fit you in now, his next appointment isn’t for thirty minutes,” she hands him a clipboard for him to fill out his information as a first time client and then she scurries to the back to presumably talk to the doctor.

Jared kind of stares at the sheet for a second, contemplating the pros and cons of putting his real information. After a second he decides to somewhat fill out the truth, just change some of the more important details. He checks the box to mark that he has no insurance coverage and that he understands he’ll have to pay out of pocket for the visit. Genevieve comes back a moment later, an older man trailing after her, “this is Dr. Beaver,” she introduces, taking the clipboard when Jared holds it out to her.

“What happened to you son?” Jim Beaver whistles lowly, eyes taking in the careful way Jared’s holding his wrist and how he’s heavily leaning on the counter. Not to mention the bruises that are peeking out from his shirt collar and jacket sleeves. Jared almost wants to laugh at the thought of what Jim’s face might be once he takes his clothes off for the exam.

Jared had somewhat thought of his story, enough that he knows not to say the words ‘huge ass wolves’ or he’s likely to get a ticket straight to the looney bin. No, Jared’s a little smarter than that at least, “I was headin’ home when some dogs attacked me in the park, viscous fuckers, did a number on me.” It’s plausible, people get attacked by dogs all the time right?

A silent look passes between Jim and Genevieve, an expression settling into their features that Jim does a much better job of hiding. _Fear._ It’s there, naked in the way he reads it from the girl’s eyes. She’s afraid all of a sudden. It’s a little…odd. Sure, Jared understands if there was concern, even anxiousness at the thought that some wild dogs might be running around town, but the quick jump to fear is jarring.

Jim clears his throat, breaking the eerie tension that had settled over them and gestures towards the door they had just come from, “let’s get you in a room son and take a look.”

Genevieve hands over his information sheet to the doc and then retreats to her seat behind the reception desk, still looking unsettled.

Jared turns into the first open door at Jim’s instruction and takes a seat on the end of the exam table. “Jared is it? Where are you hurt son?” The man glances quickly over his information before placing the sheet aside and turning his gaze patiently to Jared.

“I think my wrist is broken, left leg’s a mess, and probably some broken ribs? Plus all the scratches,” Jared kind of gestures vaguely to the areas where it hurts, grinning sheepishly when Jim tuts at him.

“If you could undress down to your underwear I can get a better look at these injuries,” the doctor politely turns around and busies himself with preparing some antiseptic wash and other materials to presumably clean up Jared’s multitude of scratches. The snap of the gloves echoes around the quiet room as Jared quickly undresses and throws his clothes into the chair next to the exam bed. Jim’s eyebrows are the only thing that give away his surprise when he turns around and gets a good look at Jared. The boy’s a little uncomfortable with the heaviness of the man’s stare but he fights through it, eyes moving to somewhere over the doc’s shoulder. “You weren’t kidding when you said they did a number on you,” Dr. Beaver whistles lowly, pulling a rolling tray with all his supplies over to the side of the exam bed. “Just lay back and relax, I’m going to clean out some of these wounds and determine the more serious ones and whether they need stitches.” Jared sighs lightly, letting himself fall back against the slightly raised head of the bed and closes his eyes. Jim’s touch is light, delicate as he wipes the wounds with sterile gauze and antiseptic wash. He only winces a few times, particularly around his bruised ribs and the red, raw skin on his leg. “There’s a particularly deep gouge on your leg here that is probably going to need stitches. I’m also going to need to take some x-rays of your wrist, chest, and leg to make sure they’re not broken.” Jim steps back from the exam bed and opens a cabinet to pull out a hospital gown. “If you want to put this on we can go to the room next door and get those x-rays taken real quick before I stitch you up.”

Jared grunts heavily as he lifts himself off the bed, Jim helps him pull on the gown when he realizes how useless Jared’s one wrist is and then ties it loosely for him in the back. “Follow me son,” Jim leads him back out of the exam room and into the room next door that is relatively empty except for a large x-ray table in the middle of it. “Hop up there and then I’ll position you as needed,” he steps off to the side and puts on a lead apron before coming back over to Jared’s side and moving the table until Jared’s leg is in the marked box that will take an x-ray. “Try to straighten your foot out, I know it hurts but I need to see whether the bones are out of place or not.”

The pain of trying to straighten his leg feels like needles up his calf, he’s sweating heavily as Jim repositions the limb as he needs and shoots off a few x-rays. When they move onto his chest Jared almost doesn’t hear him at first, ears ringing with pain.

“This one will be easier son, just lay down,” Jim only takes one picture, pleased to see that while there is two broken ribs, the fracture is tiny and will heal easily on their own. “Okay last thing, your wrist, you can keep laying down. I’ll just position you how I need you.”

Again, the manipulation of his wrist is like fire lighting up his veins. Jared’s jaw aches with how hard he’s grit his teeth over the past thirty minutes of radiographs. By the end of it even gently flexing his fingers feel like someone is twisting his wrist off.

“You did great Jared, I’ll get you some pain medication right away, take the edge off.” Jared’s much slower getting up this time, but Jim takes pity on him and brings in a wheelchair to move him back to the exam room. With the help of doc’s steadying hands, Jared makes it back onto the exam table. “This is some morphine, it’ll probably hit you like a ton of bricks, but you’ll want it when I start stitching that leg up down there. I’m also gonna have to cast both your wrist and your leg, your tibia and fibula have a pretty clean break through them and some of your wrist bones are fractured.” Jared almost doesn’t feel the prick of the needle over everything else. At first he feels warmth and then all of a sudden he feels nothing. The fuzzy numbness is nice, comforting even. Watching the doc move around is hard and makes his vision swim so he moves his eyes up to the ceiling where nothing’s moving and he feels less nauseous. Vaguely, Jared hears the doc say he’s starting on the stitches on his leg, but he doesn’t feel much other than a weird pulling sensation.

He’s floating, Jared feels as if his blinks are getting longer, like he’s spending more time with his eyes closed than open. There’s a hard yank to his leg and Jared’s eyes shoot open, a cry of pain coming out sluggishly from the back of his throat. Jim’s working on casting his leg and the yanking sensation was him trying to keep Jared’s ankle straight in the cast so the bones heal correctly. Even through the morphine it hurts like a bitch. His wrist doesn’t go much better and he can feel the tears at the corners of his eyes as the doc helps him back into his shirt and finally puts him into a sling to help minimize the movement of his arm. “Jared I’m going to give you a tetanus shot and a rabies vaccination just in case. You’re going to have to come back and booster the rabies vaccine since we can’t be sure these—animals—weren’t rabid.” The Doc seems well meaning but Jared’s enjoying the slightly floaty feeling that’s still an undercurrent. The pricks from the vaccinations don't even register on Jared's radar, he only realizes they've been done when Doctor Jim snaps his gloves into the hazardous waste trash can.

He blinks slowly—once, twice, three times—and then struggles to sit up from where he’s been slumped on the hospital bed. “Okay Doc, what else do you need from me?”

“Gen’s going to come in and get you checked out and then you’re free to go once the police take your statement,” at Jared’s scattered look Jim raises his hands in a placating gesture, “it’s procedure in viscous animal attacks like this I’m afraid. Just hang tight Jared, you won’t be here for much longer.” With a comforting pat on his good shoulder, Doctor Beaver leaves him alone.

Jared slowly starts to feel the tendrils of panic setting in—he can’t get interviewed by the cops, they’ll want his real information, it’ll get entered into the system and then his dad will find him, it’ll be like a flashing beacon saying where he is. His thoughts are interrupted by Genevieve entering the room with a few stapled pieces of paper, she doesn’t seem to notice how antsy he’s suddenly gotten. “I have your discharge instructions, injury care and so on. And here’s your bill,” she hands it all over, waiting patiently while Jared glances over the bill. It’s all surprisingly cheap…minus the cost of the drugs and vaccines but a few hundred bucks seems cheap comparatively. Must be the small town doc gimmick. Grimacing, Jared retrieves his wallet from his jeans on the chair against the wall—a difficult task with only one good arm—and pulls out the meager remains of the cash he had gathered for his escape. He’s left with a measly ten bucks…

“Hope you feel better Jared, you can get dressed, the cops should be here soon,” Gen gives a soft smile and leaves the room without looking back. Jared looks down at himself, half dressed and now with a clunky cast and boot on his left leg. He sighs and makes a grab for his jeans again. Jared has to take the walking boot off his cast so he’s able to slide his leg through the hole in his jeans, it’s a tight fit but he manages. He awkwardly rolls a cuff into the bottom of the left leg and replaces the walking boot around the bottom foot part of the cast. Slipping his good leg into the other side of the jeans he pulls them the rest of the way up and has to do a weird laying motion that involves some weird contorting to get them buttoned up with only one hand. He can thankfully just toe on his one shoe and bends to pick up the other one. Jared shoves it in the hole of the sling along with the papers and then grabs his leather jacket.

Testing how loud the cast is by walking a few times back and forth across the exam room, Jared determines it’s quiet enough if he goes a little more carefully. The door doesn’t make a sound as he opens it, and a quick listen alerts him to no one being immediately in the vicinity. He pokes his head out and glances in all directions. Seeing no one Jared hobbles out and heads in the opposite direction of the waiting room. There are more exam rooms down the hall, easily identifiable by the numbers on the door, a bathroom, a storage closet (Jared actually opens this door, unsure of what it might be), and then two other doors at the end of the hall. He puts his ear to the first door and hears some low murmurs that make him shrink back uneasily. That leaves the last door, Jared tries to listen for anything behind it but can’t make anything discernable out. When he opens it there’s no light on so he struggles to find the switch. It bathes the rectangular room in a dim glow that illuminates more storage racks and items packed into the tiny room. Vaguely Jared can make something out on the back wall. He steps into the room and carefully makes his way through the shelves until he’s standing in front of a backdoor that he presumes must lead outside into a back alley of sorts. At first glance he doesn’t see any alarm on it, there’s nothing denoting a fire door or something that might start screaming at him if he opens it. It’s locked by a deadbolt and the doorknob but Jared’s trying to get out not in so that isn’t really a problem.

Slowly, delicately, Jared unlocks the deadbolt and flicks the doorknob lock. He gently twists the knob with his only good hand and pulls as softly as possible. Jared pauses, listens and waits, but there’s no screaming siren and he doesn’t hear anyone coming for him so he opens the door wider and peaks outside. It is an alley outback of the little office building.

He tries to walk as quietly as possible but the cast and boot on his foot are a little cumbersome. Regardless he pushes on and feels his chest unclench a little as he steps into the back alley behind the office building. He’s careful to shut the door behind him softly, and with each subsequent step away from the door he can feel himself relax a little more. Jared just needs to lay low until he feels a bit better and then he needs to get the hell outta dodge. Some weird shit is obviously going down in this town and Jared doesn’t want to be any more of a part of it.

It’s easy sneaking around the side of the building and hopping in the impala to make a rather flashy get away. He feels a little bad for ditching the doc and Gen after they were so nice to him but he really can’t deal with the cops right now. Especially on morphine when he’s a little more loose lipped than he would like. His original plans of heading back to the motel are dashed when he stops at the intersection and smells the diner across the road and his stomach takes that moment to remind him that he’s actually starving. Grimacing lightly and checking all directions he buzzes across the intersection and parks in the tiny parking lot off the side of the diner where his impala’s a little less noticeable upon first glance. He gives a little thought towards his last meager ten dollars in his wallet, but settles on the idea that he’ll only order a burger, nothing more, he’s starving regardless.

It’s practically dead inside the tiny restaurant, the morning rush having died down while Jared was getting patched up by the doc. The polite waitress that had talked to him before is buzzing around the diner, wiping down tables and clearing dishes. She glances up when the bell over the door dings and Jared catches the way her magnanimous smile dims a bit when she gets a good look at him. He must look a sight with his left arm done up in a sling and the honking boot on his leg. Even with his leather jacket slung over his shoulders the sling is rather visible.

“Hey hun, rough night?” She gestures to a clean booth, the seats being a little more comfortable than balancing on a stool at the bar. He gladly accepts the seat, sinking into the pleather with a bone deep sigh.

“You have no idea,” Jared takes a moment to close his eyes and will the spinning of the room away. He doesn’t particularly like how the morphine is making him feel, but he thinks it’s already beginning to wear off because the edges of his consciousness are losing that fuzzy, blurred feeling.

“Well I’m sorry darlin’, you want what you ordered last time?” She’s already placing a fresh cup of coffee in front of him and Jared doesn’t remember hearing her leave his side, let alone the sounds of a cup of coffee being poured. He shakes his head trying to clear it some more and then peers up at Sam through his eyelashes.

“Uh, could I just have a burger? Medium rare.” Sam gives him a look like she doubts that will fill him up, but she still putters off and leaves Jared to sink further down into the booth. It’s a little troublesome only using his good arm to do everything like pulling the cup of coffee closer to him and then juggling the hot mug without scalding himself. But the first sip is worth it and Jared swears he can feel the caffeine leaking into his bloodstream and soothing away the rest of the aches and pains.

Jared drains the rest of the cup and looks around for Sam so he can ask for another but he finds her with her back to him at the register. She’s speaking softly into the phone, twirling the chord around her finger in a display of nerves. Jared’s not sure why but the display sets him on edge. He’s about to speak up when the cook rings the bell for order up and Sam’s snapped out of whatever conversation she’s having. They both jump slightly, Jared’s eyes getting drawn to where his food is being pushed through the slot in the wall. Sam fumbles the phone back onto the cradle and then moves over to grab the tray with his order on it.

“Sorry for the wait sweetie, eat up,” her smile looks a little strained and Jared can feel the hair on the back of his neck prickling but he shoves the feeling down and smiles his most reassuring grin.

“Thanks ma’am,” he digs in like he hasn’t eaten in weeks as opposed to less than a day. When she brings out his slice of pie he’s ready to refuse but she just shushes him and says it’s on the house…and same for the lasagna she brings him and the sausages…he can’t remember the last time he was so ravenous but he attributes it to the rough night and the blood loss. Sam seems happy enough to keep feeding him, telling him not to worry about the bill because he’d had such a rough time. Jared chalks it up to small town flair, the reasoning behind why she’s so concerned about a mere stranger.

“You take care of yourself hun, okay?” She pats him softly on the shoulder and gives him a look that is hard to decipher before disappearing off behind the counter. She’d waved him off when he’d asked for the bill, but he still leaves her five of his last ten dollars as a tip. Sam’s look is almost sad…resigned as she watches him walk out the door. Jared’s starting to wonder whether that’s the local’s default facial expression. Jared’s not really paying attention as he hobbles back behind the diner to his car so it’s a complete surprise when he runs head on into someone. The strong hands that steady him from falling, gentle on his hurt arm, but solid and so fucking warm. He swears he feels a nose graze up the side of his neck, causing a full body shiver to materialize. Jared startles, eyes trailing up from the ground to focus on the face that’s entirely too close to his.

“Jensen?” Jared mumbles, vague recollections of the hot biker from the night before—the one good part of the night that is. “Uh, sorry man,” Jared moves to extricate himself from the embrace, but Jensen keeps a point of contact with one hand on his good shoulder. He smells so fucking good, all spice and musk that Jared completely misses his question the first time, “wah?”

Jensen chuckles lightly, a smirk on his face, “I said, what happened to you man? Yah weren’t nearly as beat up when you left me last night. You fall down some more stairs?”

Jared can feel himself flushing, the embarrassment of having slipped down the stairs and truly how drunk he had been momentarily making him forget the horror that had happened after. “Uh-uhm-er, I got attacked by some wild dogs on the way back to my motel.” He looks sheepish, hoping that Jensen won’t comment on how tongue-tied he seems to be around him. Jensen’s face is stony when Jared chances a peak up at his face, a shocking about-face in his attitude. It makes him look 100% the scary biker that his clothing projects. He startles slightly, unsure where the warmth from their earlier conversation had gone. It makes him itch, skin tight as some sort of primal urge is pushing him to either run or give in…but give in to what? He shrinks slightly, back bowed as he subconsciously tries to make himself smaller. Jensen must see this, it shocks him from whatever black mood had moved in and fogged over his brain.

An easy smile creeps back over his lips, soothing away the unease that had settled between them. “Shit dude, I’m sorry, that’s some bad luck.” Jared feels his muscles unlock, Jensen’s hand that hadn’t left his good shoulder squeezing encouragingly. And just like that the switch is flipped again, the mood between them once again light hearted and easy.

“You’re telling me,” Jared reaches up with his good hand to nervously comb through his unruly locks, the action drawing Jensen’s gaze, which sweeps over his features appraisingly and results in a warm flush conjured up Jared’s neck. He honestly can’t remember the last time he blushed so much.

“Well, at least tell me you’re gonna be on bed rest for a few days to heal up?” Jensen finally steps back, but moves to lean against the side of the diner, casually cool. Jared’s momentarily distracted, eyes tracking the easy grace that Jensen is able to effect. Even in just some beat up ripped jeans, a light Henley and his motorcycle cut Jensen can see the concealed strength. It’s there like an intangible thing, an aura that just seems to ooze from his very being.

“Actually, I had originally just planned on passing through, I’m just gonna try and get a good night of sleep tonight and then try to hit the road again tomorrow,” his words have a sort of effect on Jensen, he goes from easy, loose grace to immediately tense and poised. He’s upset, but for the life of him Jared can’t understand why. Even if Jensen was just looking to get his dick wet, a normal stranger wouldn’t be this upset over him leaving. Immediately, the hair on the back of Jared’s neck stands up, unease flowing through him as he works to solve the puzzle he barely has any pieces to. “I-I’m gonna go…” Jared moves to hobble around the large man, aiming for a wide berth around the corner of the diner but instead of staying put Jensen moves to fall in step with him. Despite his uneven and slow pace Jensen doesn’t look at all hampered. He still manages to look graceful as he takes what in probably half his normal step so that he doesn’t out pace Jared. Jensen following him makes a sweat break out on his brow, suddenly he’s chilled where he had been overheated all morning. But when Jared glances to the side Jensen looks like he’s doing everything in his power to look nonthreatening. Everything’s throwing Jared for such a loop that he staggers gracelessly, suddenly woozy and confused. The biker looks poised to catch him, like he’s worried Jared’s about to feint on him, but he also realizes that Jared doesn’t want to be touched at that exact moment…so he just hovers.

Jared catches himself regardless, sways stupidly before coming to a stop, “I’m good.” He practically growls the words, the guttural sound that comes out foreign in his mouth. Jared looks stunned, unsure of where that tone even came from. Jensen looks mildly surprised, soft smile curving onto his lips.

“Hey, can I take yah to dinner—as y’know…a sorry for the bad run of luck?” The request is just shocking enough that Jared’s eyes snap up, zig-zagging across Jensen’s face in an effort to figure out if he’s just bullshitting.

“I—I don’t know if—uh” Jared fumbles for words, suddenly unsure of himself. A part of him wants to see where this leads, wants to rekindle the heat from the previous night at the bar, wants to see how much beard burn he can acquire across his body…but the other part of him wants to just get the hell out of his creepy town.

“Please? Seriously, my treat, food’ll be so good you’ll dream about it after,” Jensen practically begs, shifting slightly from foot to foot.

Jared’s all set to deny him, even opens his mouth with the word ‘no’ on his tongue, but he suddenly hears himself agreeing. “—I guess…sure, what time?”

Jensen looks happy, perks up like a dog with a scent in his nose, “I can pick you up at seven? You staying at the motel?”

“Uh sure…how did you know that?” Jared questions, guard instantly back up again.

Jensen doesn’t even look fazed by the question, all easy smiles and grace, “it’s the only motel in the city dude.” His response only makes it mildly better. “I’ll see you at seven Jared!” Jensen calls over his shoulder as he waves goodbye and walks back around the side of the diner and disappears.

Jared resigns himself to an afternoon of anxiously fretting over his outfit and worrying about whether Jensen is actually a psychopath. He sighs heavily as he settles into the impala’s driver seat, tonight’s going to be a long night. God willing, the night will hopefully not include another mauling and near death experience. God willing.

 

||

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading! sorry it took so long. my schedule has been crazy and my poor dog isn't doing too well. 
> 
> hopefully i'll have the next chapter up much faster!
> 
> xo
> 
> [ all graphics are made by me. ]


	3. but at my best I am my worst.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it's time for the big date...(date? dinner? thingy? is it even a date? jared sure doesn't fucking know) but trouble's brewing on the horizon and jensen's smack dab in the middle of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for all the concern about my dog! Sadly we've known she has a large inoperable tumor for a while so it's more of a 'when' not 'if' scenario at this point. Thankfully, she bounced back after having a rough weekend so no need for the serious/sad talks yet. i'm coming to terms with the fact that my chapters are long as hell and only getting longer each time i draft them and add all the juicy bits (insert crying face here) so i apologize for the wonky upload schedule but i'm trying to tweak the chapters for as much enjoyment as possible.
> 
> this chapter's going to be a little different, it will be the first time we see a shift to following Jensen's point of view as opposed to only seeing the story from jared's take! I hope you like it, and I hope it helps highlight some more characters and backstory/plot!

 

_[ ‘_ _I've seen better days_

_  
So unafraid in my youth_

_  
I can't breathe, much less believe the truth_ _‘ ]_

 

||

 

Jared knows he’s unnecessarily freaking out. The pessimistic side of his brain telling him that Jensen’s just trying to be nice because of how fucked he looks from the attack…while the damn optimistic side is screaming that Jensen wants a piece of him—exactly like Jared had hoped when he left the bar the other night. It’s even more stupid that he’s been through the rather meager selection of clothes he had brought with him a total of five times—as if one more look inside the duffle bag would magically reveal something different.

The tall man sighs fitfully, and gingerly let’s his bulk rest on the edge of the bed to give his broken leg a rest. He can feel a tension headache starting behind his eyes, no doubt a side effect of the children screaming their little hearts out down at the pool. They sound even louder than before, the shrieks seeming to echo around Jared’s skull rather viciously. Jared’s body is pulling him in a few different directions, part of him just wanting to pass out and sleep off the achy, feverish feeling—but another part of him entirely too antsy to rest in one place for too long. Then there’s the undeniable itch that’s lodged under his skin sometime during the day. It’s driving Jared absolutely bonkers with the inability to pinpoint the source. All of it is serving to make him grumbly and terse.

His neighbor drops something with a loud thunk that practically sounds like it’s right next to Jared, making the poor boy nearly jump out of his skin. For a few seconds, Jared doesn’t realize he’s baring his teeth but he writes it off as an odd fight or flight response to being scared shitless.

Ultimately, Jared settles on his least offensive clothing, a black long sleeve button down paired with his leather jacket and his least hole-y dark wash jeans and leather boots. It’s a task getting the clothing on without fucking up his already beaten and bruised body, but Jared is pleasantly surprised to note his ribs don’t feel as bad as they did that morning. He’s mostly forgone the sling, annoyed with the restriction of his arm and in all honestly it doesn’t hurt too bad to have full movement of his arm back. The cast keeps him from moving his wrist still, but he’ll take the small liberties where he can. Rather belatedly, Jared realizes that he only needs one boot since he’s got the walking cast on the other foot.

A quick survey of his appearance in the mirror and Jared’s only moderately happy with the reflection staring back at him. It’ll have to do, considering he’s low on everything: clothing choice, cash, energy. He hopes it’s not some fancy place, not that he can really see Jensen taking him somewhere fancy-schmancy but the brief fear flickers to life as Jared imagines walking into some restaurant severely underdressed and being an eye sore. Jared shakes himself, and decides to watch a little TV to try and distract himself. The volume is wonky because everything is entirely too loud, Jared turns it down as much as possible because even near mute the voices are screaming at him from the tinny speakers. Jared suffers through a rather irritating rerun of some sitcom, grimacing at the ill-timed jokes and the overuse of the laugh track before deciding it’s not going to work and shutting the thing off again.

Glancing at the alarm clock on the bedside table shows him that he’s only managed to waste half an hour. Grumbling rather loudly Jared flops back on the bed, regretting his decision mildly when his body twinges at the rough treatment. He’s staring at the ceiling, oddly distracted by the sounds happening outside of his room….rather intensely distracted actually, by the conversation happening in the room next to his, where Jared swears he can make out every word like they’re having the discussion in the same room as him. _Were the walls always this thin?_ The man doesn’t remember, but realizes that he’d been rather sleep deprived since he’d gotten into town.

His mind wanders to his future plans, mainly his need to get the hell out of dodge tomorrow. He’s still too close to home for his liking, but leaving means needing more money. Jared reckons he’s got about a quarter of a tank left in the impala and the meager amount of cash he has left is only going to go so far. Vaguely he realizes that he’s actually paid through tomorrow night as well since he got another night this morning to add on to the two he had initially purchased when he got in town. Leaving tomorrow would mean losing money needlessly. Maybe he’s just spooked. After everything that happened last night, and how weird everyone was today once they heard what happened to him…it’s all waving red flags for Jared. It’s logical really, though. He should just stay tonight and tomorrow night, get a few good nights of rest and plan where he’s going fully before leaving the day after tomorrow. It’ll just be tight living until he can get out of this town and pick pocket in a busier place where everyone doesn’t know everyone else.

Jared doesn’t quite remember when he falls asleep, but it happens nonetheless, his body succumbing to the desperate need for energy.

||

It’s hard pulling himself away from the fledgling behind him, every instinct in Jensen’s body telling him to turn around and force Jared to come with him. It’s a pack thing, his wolf telling him that he’ll be better able to keep Jared safe and help him turn if he’s holed up at the bar with him. Jensen snarls lowly, fists briefly clenching as he marches towards his Harley dyna super glide parked haphazardly out front of the diner. He ignores the look Sam is shooting him through the front window and prefers to knock his bike into gear and roar off down the street.

The sense of calm that comes from feeling the air breeze through his hair, caressing him like a lover, is reminiscent of when he runs in the woods during full moons. It’s like a high Jensen’s always itching to ride, his eyelids briefly slipping closed as he takes a second to enjoy the afternoon sun on his face. When he opens them again he turns his motorcycle towards the bar and guns it.

It’s almost not a surprise when Jensen pulls up to find Jeffery Dean Morgan casually settled in one of the old rocking chairs on the porch. From a quick glance and a sniff of the air Jensen knows they’re alone…a fact that doesn’t bode well. JDM seems equally interested in scenting him, his eyes widening slightly from whatever he catches on Jensen’s scent…and Jensen can only imagine. Any wolf within the area could be able to smell the sweet-feverish scent of a transitioning fledgling. Jared’s like a beacon at the moment.

Steeling himself for whatever JDM’s got prepared for him, Jensen takes the steps one at a time until he’s resting comfortably on the landing looking down at their pack alpha.

“What’s up Jeff?” Jensen’s not just going to offer the information, better to bide his time and find out just exactly how much JDM knows first.

“You know exactly why the hell I’m here. Ever since Beau came back dragging Tristan’s corpse we’ve been looking for his possible fledgling. I was supposed to meet him at Jim Beaver’s practice earlier but he’d given us the slip. Then I hear through the grape vine that not only have you run into him before, but you were called by Sam specifically to come meet the kid outside the diner ‘by accident’…sound about right?” JDM’s not angry, per se. He’s not shouting yet, merely trying to ascertain just how deeply Jensen’s involved in the situation.

“I have an in with the kid, he’s starting to trust me.” Jensen has been laying the groundwork with Jared, while they had initially met over Jensen’s bar top and the chemistry had been there…Jensen’s more concerned about getting the kid to believe what he’s about to turn into so that he can safely get him through the change, **_alive_**.

“You do realize he’s a loose end right? What if he doesn’t believe you? What if he manages to run off and it all goes to shit? He could lose it with the change? He could alert some hunters to our area—” JDM’s voice is bordering on that edge of controlled fury, an area Jensen doesn’t want it to go towards.

“That’s why I’m gaining his trust, the full moon’s in two days, whether he likes it or not he’s going to turn. He either trusts me or he dies.” Jensen doesn’t quite mean it so harshly, but the minute he says it he can see that JDM mistakes the intent of his words. Where Jensen’s more concerned about the possibility of Jared dying during the turn, JDM takes Jensen’s words to mean that either the fledgling is going to comply with their rules or Jensen’s going to take him out.

Even the thought of snuffing out a life, an innocent one at that, turns Jensen’s stomach sour. Logically he knows that the oath he took to this pack and this MC says that both come first over all else…but images of Jared’s shy, unsure smile filter through his head and Jensen knows he’ll do anything to make sure the man doesn’t suffer from the mistakes of his pack.

JDM merely nods in agreement, the movement pulling a light grimace to Jensen’s face that he manages to hide while his alpha is standing up from the rocking chair. “You better be right about this kid Jensen, I’m placing a lot of trust in you.” The words rankle him, causing his hackles to raise at the suggestion that Jensen’s not up to the task. It takes everything in him not to launch himself across the porch at the pack alpha, and in some way, JDM must sense that because he merely smirks and then easily strides off down the steps to straddle his own bike and race off into town.

Jensen snarls audibly when the insufferable man is gone, stomping over to the front door of the bar and yanking it open so that it bangs against the wall with entirely too much force. Inside is quiet, no one for once hanging around the MC headquarters like they normally would. Vaguely he realizes JDM might have scared them off when he showed up to chew Jensen out. With another sneer the man starts dragging his clothes off, a primal part of him more comfortable once the more human aspects of him have been shed. He rolls out his neck and cracks his spine before initiating the change. Sickening bone pops and something akin to a shredding sound are heard for a mere moment before in place of the once large man is a ginormous black wolf. He shakes himself out, delighted to once again feel close to nature with four solid paws on the ground and covered in downy black fur.

Jensen takes off through the open front door, picking up speed towards the nearest tree line and trying to release the anxious tension trapped along his shoulders. Running is a release, a feeling that Jensen is able to give over to the more wolf part of his brain and table the human thoughts for at least a little while. He’s tracking a deer when a sound off to his left distracts him. A large shape incoming quickly enough that Jensen barely has time to brace himself before a slightly shorter but brawnier auburn wolf barrels into him.

They wrestle for a few minutes, until Jensen’s got his friend successfully pinned and then they separate the way two friends with years of experience fake fighting can, no hard feelings. Chris shakes himself when he pops up, some of Jensen’s spittle from where he’d grabbed the man by the neck to hold him down until he surrendered, flinging off in different directions. Then it’s the two of them, once again picking up the trail of the deer that Jensen had found before they make quick work of tracking it down and with an ease that comes from years of reading each other’s moves, they bring the deer down together like an efficient team.

It’s a quick eat, Jensen hungrily scarfing down a large part of the meat while Chris nearly picks at his favorite bits, allowing Jensen his fill. They leave the rest for nature to reclaim, assured that the creatures in the woods would enjoy what they could not finish.

They trudge back to the bar, at a much slower pace and unhurried. Having known each other for years Jensen never finds their walks like this uncomfortable, regardless of whether they are able to speak as wolves or not wouldn’t affect how Jensen is sure Chris already knows what’s going on and is merely here for company.

The bar’s front door is still wide open so both wolves lope in and shift back in mere seconds. Where two large wolves had been suddenly becomes two equally naked man. Being naked comes with the territory so neither man is uncomfortable around each other, easily picking up their clothing with an unhurried gait and pulling them on with efficiency. Jensen wagers that Chris must have heard what was going on and had come to the bar to find Jensen’s clothes in a pile on the ground and shifted to follow him out to the woods.

“So what’d JDM want?” Chris asks easily, always knowing how to hit straight to the subject without mincing words.

“He’s pissed I’ve been talking with the fledgling behind his back. Thinks I’m going to kill the kid if he doesn’t adhere to our rules.”

“And you’re not?” Chris questions, pausing in where he’s pulling on his biker cut to look straight at Jensen. They stare each other down for a second, enough time for Chris to get his answer, “okayyyy then, so what the fuck are yah gonna do with him instead?”

“Fuck if I know, I’ve somehow got dinner plans with him tonight.” Jensen shrugs his shoulders, cringing when Chris’ loud belly laugh sounds behind him.

“Okay, so after you fuck him what are you going to do with him?”

Jensen shoots the man a glare, knowing if it were anyone else he would have punched them, but Chris has certain liberties as his best friend. “I’m not fucking him Chris, I’m trying to get him to trust me so that when I tell him he’s going to turn into a fucking wolf and that we’re wolves he doesn’t freak the fuck out.”

“Yeah yeah yeah, fine, fuck him after he turns then.”

“Shut the fuck up dude,” Jensen bites out, but he laughs to take the sting out of the words. He can’t lie that he’s not attracted to Jared, Chris saw them the first night when Jared wandered into his bar. Maybe after, when Jared’s not in danger of dying, then they can revisit whatever chemistry happened between them the other night. However, right now Jensen’s got to focus on getting him to eventually believe what’s about to happen to him…god help him.

“Poor fucker,” Chris intones, taking a bottle of jack off the shelf behind the bar and pouring them two shots. Morosely Jensen takes a shot in agreement.

||

_He’s running, sprinting really, through the woods at night. The moon is bright enough he can see his way, but that’s not what has the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. Behind him he can hear the crashing of foliage, the snap of a twig, the relentless pounding of feet—paws? Something is chasing him. Jared panics, his mind slowly working to the idea that it must be the wolves that attacked him from before, they’re back to finish him off. Jared has to get away, he has to outrun the monsters behind him._

_Jared doesn’t know where he’s going, just assumes that if he keeps heading straight he’ll have to hit something, anything. He wants to scream but no sound comes out. Everything is silent minus the beat of his heart and the thundering thing following him. It’s eerie how much this all feels familiar, briefly Jared looks down and sees paws where his feet and hands are supposed to be. He stumbles, suddenly going as slow as molasses, he watches as the ground comes up to greet him but Jared doesn’t feel any pain from the impact. When he looks again his feet and hands are back to normal, back to human._

_Whatever is following him pauses with his fall, the giant thing a presence over his shoulder but Jared can’t muster the energy to look behind him. He can feel the hot puff of breath on the skin of his neck and slowly a memory works to the surface of earlier in the day, when he ran into Jensen outside of the diner, the man’s hands steadying him solidly and the warmth of his breath on his neck…the cold nose dragging up lightly before pulling back—Jared turns to look behind him—_

The tall man wakes with a start, nearly flailing off the bed as the panic from his dream bleeds into the here and now. It takes a few mere moments to realize that he is indeed still in his hotel room and not sprawled somewhere out in the forest. There’s not wolves breathing down his neck waiting to finish their kill. His heart slows it’s incessant hammer as he logically calms himself down. Snippets of the dream come back to him, but the more Jared tries to parse it out the more the actual details start to slip through his fingers like sand. Eventually all Jared can recall is the blind panic and the feel of his feet hitting the earth as he ran.

Slowly, Jared pushes himself to a sitting position and looks off to the side where the alarm clock is on the bedside table. With a shock, Jared realizes that he woke up just in time for Jensen to pick him up for dinner. He hobbles quickly into the bathroom to fix his hair and straighten his clothing before hobbling back to the front door and taking a peek outside the dingy curtains. Sitting like a beacon in the parking lot is Jensen. He’s forgone his usual motorcycle cut for a dark gray henley topped with a worn and beaten jean jacket and some black jeans. Jared smirks a bit when he sees that the man is still wearing his biker boots. Jared quickly grabs up a bottle of pain pills he had snagged from home on his way out and pops two in hopes that the aching throb in his leg will hold off for the night.

Steeling himself for a second, Jared takes some deep breaths and then opens the door gingerly. Jensen looks up almost immediately from where he’s casually leaned a hip against a gorgeous classic rust red pickup. It makes the man nervous as he locks his motel room door and then slowly makes his way down the stairs, it taking twice as long with his walking boot. He admires the truck all the way across the parking lot, taking in the chrome details and the excellent wax job as he gets closer.

“Thought you were a biker?” Jared teases, giving a small, warm smile in greeting.

Jensen chuckles lightly, the rough ambrosia of his voice doing weird flip-floppy things to Jared’s stomach, “didn’t think the bike would be easy for you with your injuries.” Jared concedes that point, trying to imagine where he would have rested his walking boot if he had to ride bitch on Jensen’s bike.

He’s only a little disappointed that he’s not going to get to smush himself against Jensen’s back anytime in the near future. It would have been a good memory to take with him when he eventually leaves here. One of very few good memories he’ll have from his time in this town. “Your truck is amazing,” Jared eventually gushes, when he realizes he’s been silent too long while thinking about rubbing himself against Jensen on a motorcycle.

“Thanks, fixed ‘er up myself, she’s a 1970’s classic.” Jensen looks incredibly proud of his work, eyes warm as they hover over the pickup with boundless admiration.

“Oh cool, I helped my dad and brother fix up the impala,” Jared relays with a thumb hooked over his shoulder towards the other classic car in the lot. He mentally kicks himself for opening the door for talk of his family, a subject that Jared doesn’t want to touch with a ten foot pole. But Jensen just smiles, before gesturing towards the pickup and they both get in. The ride is short but comfortable, Jensen filling the minutes with talk of how much work it took to get his baby in working order. Jared’s impressed to hear how the pickup started and to see how far she’s come.

They pull up in front of a cozy looking place, the sign for the restaurant painted onto the glass of the front window as opposed to opting for the typical neon of today’s time. _Vollmond Restaurant,_ Jared remembers enough of high school german that he can suss out the meaning to be Full Moon Restaurant, especially with the beautifully painted full moon behind the words on the window. Inside, is dimly lit and intimately set with high backed booths that afford quite a bit of privacy while the rest of the interior is dripping in dark leather and wood. The thing that really draws Jared in though, is the delicious smell of food the minute he steps inside. Jensen leads them over to a booth near the back, further away from the few patrons that are there. Jared glances around warily, concerned about pissing off some hostess by sitting without their permission but Jensen’s air of authority seems to be all encompassing.

A petite girl comes bustling from the back, smile lighting across her face when her eyes land on Jensen. “Jenny, you didn’t tell me you were coming tonight!” The man actually looks embarrassed, tough biker aura and all, this girl just called him Jenny without batting an eye.

“Mac don’t be a brat, introduce yourself,” Jensen gestures across the table towards Jared, who looks supremely uncomfortable with having the attention placed solely on him. Like Jensen had thought, Mackenzie’s eyes get comically wide when she looks at Jared and then back at Jensen. He shakes his head minutely and the girl quickly composes herself, that bright sunshiney smile back on her face in an instant.

“I’m Mackenzie, Jensen’s little sister, nice tameetcha,” she extends her hand politely and Jared quickly shakes it and introduces himself, looking even more confused by the second. Mac takes one look at him and then turns to Jensen and places her hands on her hips. “You did tell him our family owns this restaurant right? That our parents started the place?”

Jensen has the ability to look contrite, his complexion a little flushed as he looks anywhere but at his sister, “might have slipped my mind.”

“Jesus Christ Jenny, sorry my brother is so absolutely hopeless, I’ll bring you guys out some water and grab some menus.” Mac whirls off like the tornado of a girl that she is and Jared feels the emptiness of her retreat like a physical thing.

“Sorry I forgot to mention that our family owns the restaurant. My parents started it a few decades ago and we’ve taken over since their passing.” Jensen gets this sad, wistful look on his face, the expression spearing Jared right to the core.

“No it’s okay, sorry you had to bring up painful memories.” Jared hurriedly apologizes, hoping to soothe the ache he can see forming.

Jensen snaps out of it then, quickly looking up and focusing on Jared, “no worries man, they’re not painful per se anymore, just always get me in a mood…” Jensen is adept at changing the subject, steering the conversation towards cars and motorcycles, pleasantly surprised when Jared is equally knowledgeable. Mac comes back quickly with some menus and some glasses of water before telling Jensen she’ll open a nice bottle of red for dinner as well. Jared initially wants to beg off the alcohol but realizes it might help him calm down a bit. She comes back again with some fresh bread rolls and this cinnamon sugar butter that Jared wants in an IV pumped directly into his veins it’s so good.

“You guys know what you want?” Mac asks happily, bouncing slightly on her heels.

“I’ll take the usual, sirloin steak, rare as you can get it with green beans and mashed potatoes.” Jensen smirks at Mac when she laughs at his rare comment, something telling Jared there’s an inside joke hidden in there. When he starts picturing said rare steak however, instead of being disgusted like he normally would, Jared’s mouth starts to salivate excessively. He hurriedly swallows when Mac looks at him expectantly for his order.

“I’ll take the same.” Mac nods again and bounces off to place the order while Jensen looks on with approval. Jared’s explaining about a tricky problem they had when they were restoring the impala when Mac comes back with a bottle of red wine and pours them both a heaping glass. His hand shakes minutely when he reaches forward to pick the near goblet up and take some tentative sips. It’s good…Jared takes another few large swallows before placing the glass back down on the table and looking up to Jensen who’s smiling lightly.

“So where are you traveling to?” Jensen asks out of the blue, a comfortable silence had fallen between them while Jared slowly buttered his bread roll with one hand using a series of intricate maneuvers. He nearly throws his knife at the question, unexpectedly shocked and unsure of how to answer. He peaks up through his eyelashes and Jensen seems merely a little curious nothing more. But somehow Jared still remembers back to earlier today when Jensen seemed upset when he mentioned moving on from here.

“No place in particular, west?” Jared’s still trying to decide whether that answer is too vague to pass as normal when Mac comes up with their plates of food. For being a tiny girl she doesn’t shake at all having to extend her arm to rest the heavy plates in front of the two men. They are stacked with an abundance of food, instantly triggering Jared’s stomach to growl in preparation of the feast. She dashes off to help another customer and leaves the two men alone. Jared digs in with a fervor, but realizes pretty quickly that he’s going to have trouble eating his steak with one hand in a cast. Jensen seems to realize this as well and reaches across the table to grab up his plate and drag it over so that he can quickly and efficiently slice the large piece of meat into fork sized bites for Jared. It’s rather intimate…and embarrassing to have someone have to slice his food for him. He can’t ponder the situation more because Jensen places the plate back in front of him and starts in on his own meal without a word.

It doesn’t take long for Jared’s stomach to remind him what he’s here for and he’s practically scarfing down the food like a rabid animal. He doesn’t seem aware of his actions, Jensen having stopped eating and taken to just watching him for the time being. It’s even more evident to him that Jared’s been infected. Ravenous hunger before a turn is definitely one of the signs.

Jensen knows he needs to figure out how much he remembers of the attack, if he’s told anyone outside of the town…”so you said you were attacked by some rabid dogs last night? Where were you?” Jensen winces lightly, realizing he could have started that a little better instead of just jumping right in the deep end. Jared pauses in his ravenous eating to stare up at Jensen balefully. He can tell that the wine’s taking a little effect on Jared, his movements a little loser and the tension having dropped from his previously tense shoulders. However, at the mention of the attack Jared’s right back to his cautious, withdrawn self.

Jared takes a second, merely looking over Jensen’s face, trying to glean where this questioning is going. There’s nothing there, Jensen having wiped most of his facial expression besides the one that looks like cautious interest. “I-I was walking back through the park to the motel. They came out of nowhere…” Jared breaks off, voice cracking at the end as he remembers the panic as the beasts tackled him. The _pain_.

Jensen watches the emotions flit across the boy’s face and can feel his sympathy gaining ground on his need for information. “What did they look like? Could you tell their breed?”

He practically watches the boy clam up, the slight shiver that runs down his body at the mere memory of what happened to him. “N-no, I couldn’t tell.” It’s tense silence, both men caught in a stare down that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Jensen sighs internally, realizing that he’ll probably get nothing else out of Jared until he comes clean himself.

“So how’s the food?” Jensen’s abrupt topic shift has Jared’s emotions reeling. He glances down at his half eaten plate and his stomach takes that moment to remind him that he’d been interrupted right in the middle of sating his hunger.

“It’s amazing,” Jared practically gushes, going back with gusto into attacking his plate and shoveling the morsels into his mouth.

“Good, good…” Jensen mumbles, pretty sure the boy didn’t hear him as his single-minded intensity is focused on devouring every piece of food on his plate. He takes time just to sip his wine and watch Jared work his magic. Without thought he picks up his own plate and starts shoveling its contents onto Jared’s for his eating pleasure. The man briefly looks up, eyebrows crinkling in the middle as he works to chew a particularly gamey piece of meat. “You enjoy it, I’m full,” a blatant lie, but Jared seems to accept it none-the-less and go back to hovering the plate.

Twenty minutes later Jared’s leaned back in the booth rubbing his stomach with a pleasant smile stretched across his face. Noted, food is the way to Jared’s heart. “That was so delicious Jensen, thanks for bringing me,” Jared mumbles, cheeks warm from the wine and belly fully from the food. He’s going to have to be rolled out of here.

“Don’t mention it Jared, think of it as a sorry for your recent bad luck, hopefully this helps you on your path to healing,” Jensen studiously keeps himself from outright mentioning the attack and Jared seems to be floating enough on the wine that his vague reply doesn’t send him into an emotional spiral like before. “You got room for dessert?”

Jared groans loudly, but Jensen’s already ordering something called chocolate death. Yeah he’s going to die alright, especially if he eats anything else.

||

Jensen’s loosely guiding Jared back out to his truck, amused by the way the man is swerving from just the small amount of alcohol he had. Either that or Jared’s really a light weight…but Jensen remembers him handling quite a bit of alcohol the other night at his bar.

“Sh-shit,” Jared hiccups, “forgot those pain pills can knock you for a loop if you drink, whoops.” Jared’s chuckling like it’s hilarious and sways a few steps to the right.

“You shoulda said something, I woulda not gotten the wine,” Jensen grumbles in that rich Texan flair of his, opening the passenger door to literally pour Jared into the seat.

“Nah, I’mokie, just gonna sleep it off.” Jared looks up at him with a wide grin, patting himself down like he’s checking for all his items and then obediently buckling himself in. Jensen’s thankful that Jared’s a happy drunk. He gets into the truck himself and notes that Jared’s eyelids are already fluttering like he’s trying to fight off sleep. Jensen chuckles and puts the truck in gear to get the man back to the motel.

Jared zones in and out during the drive back, familiar landmarks in the town flashing before his eyes before they flutter closed time and time again. He feels irrationally hot, a part of him thinking it’s the wine but another part of him entirely too focused on the way the car smells like Jensen. Jared shifts in his seat and nearly moans at the way his jeans rub over his dick. He enjoys the feeling, stifling little noises as the bumps in the road serve to rev him up even more. A part of Jared’s brain finds this reaction to a little dinner and wine completely irrational. Entirely too horny for his own good. The drive seems even quicker than when they first made it earlier and all too soon Jensen’s placing a warm hand on his shoulder to wake him up. He startles to alertness, eyes darting around before realizing it’s just him and Jensen in the truck outside of his motel, vaguely Jared realizes he must have fallen asleep. “Hey Jay, we’re back, you want some help up to your room?” He doesn’t really remember nodding or anything that resembles denial or affirmation but suddenly Jensen’s on his side of the car and helping him out. Jared doesn’t notice how Jensen freezes for a second when he tries to manhandle Jared to standing and his arm brushes deliberately against the gun concealed in the inner pocket of the taller man’s leather jacket. There’s no mistaking what it is and a whole new round of questions spark to life for Jensen.

They’re quite the pair as they struggle up the stairs, Jensen doing most of the heavy lifting because Jared’s one good foot seems out of the count for the moment. At his door Jared struggles to get his keys out of his pocket and practically giggles like a teenage girl when Jensen has to hug him from behind to reach around and unlock the door for him. Jared spins around unexpectedly, meaning to thank Jensen for a nice night and maybe even summon the courage to kiss him or something equally as embarrassing but Jensen beats him to the punch by pulling him into a warm hug. His nerve endings are on fire, swearing that he feels Jensen dragging his nose up the sensitive veins in his neck and behind the hollow of his ear. The warm puffs of breath Jensen’s releasing causing his hair to stand on end with arousal. The heat he’d been feeling during the car ride sparking back to life as a roaring fire. All too soon Jensen is pulling back with a soft smile on his face. “Night Jared, hope you feel better tomorrow, tonight was fun.” And then the man turns around and starts walking back down the stairs to his pickup. Jared forces himself to turn around and close himself in his motel room. A part of him disappointed that Jensen didn’t kiss him…or do something even more wicked—like throw him on the bed and ravish him. Briefly, Jared freaks out over the thought that maybe he’d been reading the situation all wrong, maybe Jensen was just from one of those touchy-feely southern families that welcomed everyone with hugs. Maybe he was just the one perverting Jensen’s actions…but then Jared starts really swaying and takes a second to lay down on the bed with the intention of resting until the room stops spinning and then get up to take his clothes off. The heat from their hug and the half-woody he’d been sporting from the car ride are too much to ignore at the moment. Jared clumsily undoes his jeans with one hand and manages to dig out his erection, loosely stroking the heated flesh until he’s leaking copious amounts of precum. All Jared can do is keep remembering the way he swears Jensen’s nose dragged up the side of his neck. Now he doesn’t have to conceal his noises, softs little gasps and moans shaking from his chest as he jacks himself off. He imagines it’s Jensen, the man’s large, warm hands swallowing his cock and teasing him mercilessly. With a soft groan and a shaking body, Jared cums over his hand and lower stomach. And almost immediately, he’s out.

Soft snores filter up through the quiet of the motel room, barely making it over the hum of the air conditioning unit or the TV from the next door neighbor.

||

Jensen pulls up to the bar with a grimace on his face. He notes the multitude of cars centered around the building. To anyone else it would look like a busy night for the bar owner but Jensen knows better. It’s a pack meeting. Almost the whole town is there, minus the few that couldn’t get away from work serving the rather small human population that actually does reside in their town. He near slams the door to the pickup before stomping up the steps and entering at the front of the bar turned town hall meeting room. People are scattered all over the place, any and all available chairs fashioned into rows pointed towards the small karaoke stage at the back. More than a few eyes turn towards his loud entrance, instantly people turn their heads in deference, offering their neck towards a stronger wolf.

“Nice of you to join us Jensen, we were just talking about how we were going to solve our little problem,” Jeffery Dean Morgan looks every bit an alpha in his prime. They’d butt heads on more than one occasion but it came with the territory of alphas. All the macho man bullshit that made it hard for them to stand down to anyone or be ordered around. Jensen had been curtailing his remarks for years, preferring to let JDM lead them while Jensen came into more of his own. He is still young after all, and with their extended life expectancy, Jensen knows his time will eventually come, regardless of whether JDM agrees or not.

“And what do you propose we do to ‘ _deal with it’_?” Jensen can’t help the steel that coats his words, bristling at the way JDM is talking about Jared as if he’s merely a bug under his shoe. He’s pissed they’re even having this meeting considering their conversation on the porch earlier today. Logically Jensen realizes their pack must be rife with rumors and JDM’s trying to curtail any misinformation, but Jensen’s still pissed regardless.

“Well the kid’s on his way to turning, right?” JDM looks around for confirmation from not only Jim Beaver but Sam who looks contrite when her eyes connect with Jensen’s.

“He is,” Jensen admits gruffly, slowly making his way through the littering of chairs to the front. Chris already has a spot next to him saved, right at the front where the enforcers and inner circle sit. He briefly makes eye contact with the man who nods lightly—showing he’ll have Jensen’s back no matter what—before he sits next to his friend and turns his attention back to their pack alpha.

“Does he know that?” the man asks, the casual air he’s effected making Jensen’s hackles raise more.

“No, he knows something’s wrong and that the attack wasn’t normal but I don’t think he’s truly aware of what’s happening to him yet.” Jensen admits all this grudgingly, but he knows that withholding from his pack is a capital offence not taken lightly.

“I’m not too happy with a fledgling running around our turf, especially one who has no idea what’s about to happen to him,” that tone is pure alpha, growly and dark and while it makes almost everyone else in the room bow their heads in deference to the alpha tone, it merely makes Jensen bristle.

“What if he goes crazy with the turn?” Someone in the crowd shouts.

“What if he alerts some hunters and gives us all away?” Someone else speaks up.

And for a few brief moments quite a few people start shouting to be heard over one another. The general panic of the pack ratcheting up a few notches while their people stir up their fears. “SILENCE.” JDM growls, instantly the room is so silent they would be able to hear a pin drop. “These are all relevant concerns—”

“He needs to pay for what he did to Tristan, for what he did to me!” Jensen had been so focused on JDM that he had failed to realize that Beau was in attendance at their pack meeting. An oversight that had probably saved the bar from an all-out brawl right as he had walked in.

Instantly Jensen and Chris are on their feet snarling, Chris surprising him by pointing an accusing finger and shouting, “this is all your fucking fault asshole, you attacked a human for sport…we haven’t done that for decades. **_You put us all at risk_**. You both got what you deserved for that. So shut the fuck up.” Jensen isn’t usually stunned into silence but Chris was usually the more mild mannered of the two of them. Obviously the man had been stewing over their predicament since it happened and it had all come to a head. When Jensen glanced up at JDM that man seemed equally perplexed at the outburst from one of his trusted inner circle. It was no secret that in a rough spot, Chris would always side with Jensen over anyone else, but he definitely was known for being the calmer head of the two and that’s why JDM continued to keep him around.

Beau snarls angrily, the eye patch over his bad eye serving to make him look even more menacing but Jensen knows Chris could beat him no contest every time. The two men make to lunge at each other but Jensen is able to hold Chris back with an arm across his chest while some of the men around Beau grab at him to stop his forward motion.

“Everyone sit the fuck down,” JDM growls out, watching as the room settles back into their seats but the tension isn’t going to cease until something is done. “Since he seems to trust you enough to talk to you Jensen I’m placing him in your care. You need to try and tell him before he turns tomorrow or he’s probably not going to make it. Take Chris, Hodge, and the prospect and watch him until he changes tomorrow, if he loses it or can’t seem to handle it…take him out.” It’s an order, a decree from the reigning alpha and as much as it pains Jensen to even think about snuffing out Jared’s life…what must be done for the good of the pack comes first, always. He knows JDM’s saying it in front of the pack now so that Jensen is held to it, their earlier porch talk with just a fact seeking mission, the true goal was to trap Jensen with the needs of the pack.

“Yes, sir,” he grimaces at the way JDM backed him into this corner.

||

_At this point it was part of his nature to conceal himself, to hide in plain sight and it was certainly paying off today. The figure watched the two men at the motel, teeth grit as he snapped a few pictures of their rather casual and intimate air. He took particular care in highlighting the injuries of the taller man, a burst of pictures being taken of each injury he could discern through his view finder. **Ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous**. _

_The man practically snarled as he followed the two men through town to the restaurant and waited impatiently for their eventual return trip to the motel. The taller man seemed to be leaning rather heavily on the owner of the truck… **drunk** , the taller man is **drunk**. The figure felt his camera come up without a second thought, easily snapping the damning images of the two men huddled close together as they swayed up the steps to the second floor motel room. _

_It’s after the second man has gotten the first into the motel room and the door is locked, that the man is able to snap a clearer picture of the second man’s face as he hops back down the stairs. Oddly, the second man pauses at the bottom of the stairs, his head tilting as if he’s listening to something. The figure can’t hear whatever it is, but it causes the second man to smirk, shaking his head with a rueful look. It makes the figure grimace, but for good measure he snaps a picture of the license plate of the truck and calls it a night as the other man takes off in said truck._

_Years of being taught to bide his time has helped the knee-jerk reaction telling the man to go back and finish what he came here to do. But that would all be for naught. The man had been taught from a young age that assessing all facts, gathering all evidence, and shoring up any and all loose ends was the only way to truly achieve one’s goals. Being hasty now wouldn’t do for either of them._

_So, with clenched fists the stalker took one last long look at the window to the taller man’s motel room, and then turned to head back to where he’d shacked up for the time being._

 

||

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tell me what you think!! oooooooohhh more shit's happeningggg.
> 
> thanks for sticking around so far, means so so so so much to see all the comments and kudos that roll in after so few chapters.  
> i'm going to start trying to reply to comments (lol we'll see)
> 
> (graphics made by me)
> 
> ps if you ever want me to recommend songs to listen to while reading this I will happily geek out over music for you and give you the songs i listen to while writing this.


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